Fantasy football strategy, rankings, and podcasts

Week three was relatively safe for everyone in the pool, with all the big favorites taking care of business. About 15% of the league were resurrected by Saint Justin Tucker's NFL record 66 yard field goal as time expired, but who could root against that kick? The Chiefs loss against the Chargers knocked out 18 for the highest number of the week bringing the total survivors down to 1064. Already 199 people have moved on this week with that actually exciting Thursday night game, where the Bengals pulled out a comeback win with a game-ending field goal. That may have been the best spot all year to play Cincinnati and they almost punished you for it. After watching my first Jaguars game, I don't see a winless season in their future.

I decided to use my two picks on the Buffalo Bills and Tennessee Titans. The Bills are the biggest favorite of the week opening at -16.5 against the quarterbackless Houston Texans. Buffalo looks to be rolling now ever since their week one slip up against the Steelers. Houston has no chance against any of the better teams in the league until they upgrade their QB. 

The Titans are my second choice for the week. There is no need for concern about them not having any wide receivers, they are playing the Jets. The Titans will get plenty of receptions on defense to make up for the absence of Brown and Jones. Zach Wilson must be ecstatic for Justin Fields' start for the Bears so he is no longer the biggest embarrassment at QB so far. Titans defense and a heavy dose of Derick Henry should be all it takes.

Good luck everyone! And Drink Five!

ENTRY #1           ENTRY #2

RAMS                 BUCCANEERS

BUCCANEERS      BROWNS

BRONCOS           CARDINALS

BILLS                 TITANS

A few big upsets in week 4 and the field has dwindled to 790, a little less than half of the original entrants. If the Bengals wouldn't have been able to complete their comeback Thursday against the Jags half of the remaining survivors would have been eliminated. As expected, the top pick Buffalo Bills with 420 selections blazed their way through the Texans 40-0. But sadly my secondary pick fell short when the Titans couldn't pull out a late comeback against Jets in OT. To my surprise the Jets 1^st win was only the second biggest eliminator of the week, with 146 losing on the Saints compared to 123. The Titans showed me they are too weak to trust against the Jaguars even with all the distractions. Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice.... you can't get fooled again.

A team that did impress me last week were the New England Patriots and there stout defense against the Tom Brady and the Bucs. This defense will give the rookie Mills fits and the Pats offense will score enough to pull off this road win. I went back and forth between Pats and Vikings for this pick. But last week the Vikings offense got shut down and for some reason I'm not comfortable picking against Detroit here. The Pats won out here because picking against Houston and getting to use a middling team like the Pats was too good to pass up.

Another strong pick is the Cowboys, but I think I'll be able to find a better spot to use them.

Cheers DrinkFive!

ENTRY #1                               ENTRY #2

            RAMS                                   BUCCANEERS

            BUCCANEERS                       BROWNS

            BRONCOS                            CARDINALS

            BILLS                                  TITANS

            PATRIOTS

Welcome to Statistically (in)Significant, the place to find great stats that probably only matter at the water cooler (or bar). Each week I'll dig through the stats of the week gone by and deliver you some choice conversation starters. All fantasy stats are half PPR scoring unless otherwise noted.

5 Rushing TDs

Nearly a quarter into the 2021 season, the league’s leader in rushing touchdowns is certainly not someone anyone expected. Sam Darnold now has 5 total rushing TDs on the season after back-to-back 2 TD games. He’s also got 5 total passing TDs, but his two INTs yesterday cost his team their perfect record.  But hey, fantasy football isn’t all about wins and losses. Darnold was the QB1 on the week, just edging out Patrick Mahomes and his 5 passing TDs. Darnold is now the QB5 on the season, just a fraction of a point behind Tom Brady for 4^th. Darnold is a game manager who just happens to be scrambling into the end zone at the right moments. His 20 carries for 58 yards on the year do not inspire confidence in his rushing abilities. My advice to you is to package Darnold in some sort of trade where you can sell him at his highest value of the season, especially before Christian McCaffrey comes back and the ground game takes over the Panthers' offense once again.

32.1 Fantasy Points

Cordarrelle Patterson is continuing his spectacular season. The 2013 first-round pick has bounced around the league for 9 years, and now finally on his 5^th team, it seems like they have unlocked his offensive abilities. Patterson finished Week 4 as the RB1 on the week, and sits as the RB2 on the season, behind only Derrick Henry (who is on pace for nearly 2,700 yards from scrimmage). Patterson’s 5 TDs is the highest total he’s had since his rookie season (and tied with Sam Darnold for the league lead). His 45 touches and 354 yards from scrimmage are both more than halfway to career highs. It’s pretty rare that a player can blow away their season-best stats 9 years into their career. He’s still only owned in 70% of Fleaflicker leagues, so I imagine that the rest of the leagues will be frantically scrambling on the waiver wire to pick him up.

4 of the Top 6 Quarterbacks are Free Agents

In fantasy football, we’re used to positional volatility. We might expect a bunch of the top-scoring kickers, defenses, or tight ends to not be on any team in a given week. What we generally don’t expect is that to be true for the quarterback position. Using our drinkfive.com fantasy league for reference, we find that 4 of the top 6 QBs in week 4’s scoring were all free agents. This includes the week’s top scorer, the aforementioned Sam Darnold (56%), Matt Ryan (76%), Taylor Heinicke (34%), and Daniel Jones (60%). We also find the most owned QB, Tom Brady (98%) put up a whopping 11.06 points, despite 43 passing attempts. So, it’s sometimes a crapshoot, even at the most consistent position in the game. That’s what makes fantasy football so much fun (and aggravating), isn’t it?

10% League Ownership

Want some positional volatility? The tight end position has it in droves. This week’s top scorer, C.J. Uzomah (another candidate for a late-career break-out) is owned in only 10% of Fleaflicker leagues. His monster game on Thursday night helped propel the Bengals to victory. 5 receptions for 95 yards and 2 TDs gave him a total of 24 fantasy points, almost 6 points more than the next highest scorer. Among the top 5 scoring TEs so far this week, their ownership caps out at 58% for Dalton Shultz. The average ownership is only 29%. When we look at the TEs who are owned in at least 90% of leagues (we must exclude Gronk and Waller, who did not or have not played yet), we find that they only scored an average of 6.6 points. This is going to be the season that benefits QB and TE streamers the most.

8-100 Yard Rushing Performances

With all of this craziness, let’s check out a position that’s all chalk, shall we? This week, there were 8–100-yard rushing performances by running backs. Every single one of those players are owned in at least 92% of Fleaflicker leagues. In fact, if you expand that list to include all-purpose yards, there were 13 such games by running backs. All but one, Cordarrelle Patterson (who led in both AP yards – the guy Is still returning kicks, and points) are owned in at least 89% of leagues. This consistency at the running back position is probably the most predictable thing in all of fantasy football this year. Even the WR position has some wacky stuff going on, like Randall Cobb’s 21.4 points, good for WR6 on the week and helping exactly nobody since he’s only owned in 24% of leagues. This is certainly an important week to work the waiver wire!

It's the end of another exciting week of football which means it's time to put your claims in for available free agents in your fantasy league to strengthen your team. I'll be going over who I think are the top five picks for you to target this week so don't miss out on them. Good luck!